


Happy to Disappoint

by lovelyleias



Series: Alien Aesthetic [3]
Category: Alien (1979), Alien Series, Aliens (1986)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Study, Families of Choice, Ripley lives, so possibly in line with Alien 5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-02
Updated: 2016-07-02
Packaged: 2018-07-19 14:04:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7364323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovelyleias/pseuds/lovelyleias
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She sleeps for years and wakes up in a world she doesn’t recognize. She doesn’t know any of the faces or places that are presented to her. <em>Your daughter is dead</em>, they tell her. <em>Your flight license is revoked</em>, they tell her. <em>You’re crazy</em>, they tell her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Happy to Disappoint

**Author's Note:**

> This one is for Ellen Ripley, the queen of my heart. You can find the accompanying graphic [here](http://lovelyleias.tumblr.com/post/145336490912/alien-aesthetic-ellen-ripley-ellen-ripley-is-born).

Ellen Ripley is born on Luna and shut away soon after, along with the rest of her generation. XMB Virus isn’t deadly, but dangerous enough to quarantine the youth of an entire planet. Schooling is set up online, and Ellen excels at all levels. _The way to succeed, she decides, is to follow the rules._ She graduates at the top of her class and is released from quarantine the same year; eighteen and already hungry for more.

 _Where will you go?_ Ask the parents she hardly knows.

 _Everywhere,_ she tells them. She doesn’t look back when she leaves.

She finds work on ships and travels around various systems, doing online coursework when she can. She enjoys the formality of being called by her surname by her crewmates. Then, during a break, there is a man, then a baby, then a marriage, then a divorce. How so much happens in the space of three years bewilders her. She’s twenty-one with a two-year-old and an uncertain future. Her Weyland-Yutani supervisors wave the by-laws broken by having a child in Ripley’s face, but her shining record is enough to eventually silence them. Ripley never imagined herself taking joy from broken rules, but her daughter’s face fills her with nothing with happiness; ex-husband be damned, consequences be damned.

But there _are_ consequences. The Company eventually throws her on a new ship as penance. The _Nostromo_ is a hulking craft, and much older than anything Ripley’s worked on. It takes a while, but she gets used to the work, and from being away from Amanda so often, and she slowly bonds with the rest of the crew. They aren’t the most agreeable of people, but then, neither is she. Years pass, and every time Ripley steps onto the _Nostromo_ for a new job, she feels something akin to home.

It takes less than a day for a monster to slaughter everyone else on the _Nostromo_. Ripley can hardly comprehend the alien, for it follows no path, carries no values, has no morals. It wishes to hunt, and so it does, and yet it doesn’t catch her. Everyone has a survival instinct inside of them, but Ellen Ripley’s is different. It is simply a strong, pure, refusal to die. And so she lives.

Afterwards, she sleeps for years and wakes up in a world she doesn’t recognize. She doesn’t know any of the faces or places that are presented to her. _Your daughter is dead_ , they tell her. _Your flight license is revoked_ , they tell her. _You’re crazy_ , they tell her.

But what she tells them is true and she’s furious when finally they realize it. _Don’t you see?_ Ripley wants to shake them. _When I open my mouth, you should fucking listen._ She only agrees to go to LV-426 for the chance to reclaim her license, a chance to begin to stitch back the threads of her dignity.

The marines are hungry for a chance to prove their worth. Ripley doesn’t like them. They’re loud and crude and they make a mockery of what she knows to be a violent threat. There is one amongst them, Hicks, who speaks softer and smarter than the rest. It’s Hicks who finds Newt. And as soon as Ripley holds the girl in her arms she knows she cannot— will not— let her go.

It all ends almost as soon as it begins. The most surprising thing to Ripley is that this time she is not the only one left. _Mommy!_ Newt screams, and throws her arms around Ripley, who’s only response is a choked out cry of _oh, god._ She clutches Newt in her arms, knowing the Queen is dead, knowing Hick’s is alive, knowing Bishop can be fixed. Knowing, for the first time in a very long time, that she is allowed to be hopeful.

Her life is destined to be hard. Whispers and rumours trail after them _(she’s cursed, she’s blessed, she’s fucked, she’s a murderer, she’s a saviour)_ and Weyland-Yutani is relentless in their quest to track Ripley’s tiny family down. But she has more important things on her mind. She becomes a second-chance mother to a second-chance daughter. The galaxy is cruel and harsh, and they all grow a little colder and tougher as the years pass.

But Ellen Ripley is a survivor. _Let them try and find us, she grits her teeth, even decades after she last worked for Weyland-Yutani. They don’t know what hell looks like. I’ll show them._


End file.
